The following update was shared by Jason Rhode, associate vice provost for Teaching, Learning, and Digital Education, at the NIU Faculty Senate meeting on March 25, 2026.
Thank you for the opportunity to share briefly today some updates on teaching and learning supports.
My goal today is to briefly share updates of 3 recent highlights as well as 3 upcoming highlights for spring.
For some background for anyone who isn’t familiar with our office, the Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning (acronym CITL) exists to support effective and innovative teaching in pursuit of transformative learning experiences. Our office is located between the parking ramp and Library and you can find us online at citl.niu.edu
While the scope of our mission as grown beyond faculty development, I’m focusing my update today on teaching effectiveness support that we offer. By the numbers this past year, our CITL team offered 156 programs on teaching effectiveness and teaching with technology for 1,201 participants, representing 2,268 hours of professional development on teaching. Additionally our team offered 1,614 consultations to 626 unique individuals from across 84 academic and support units across campus.
For anyone who would like to explore further, we provide dashboards summarizing these supports in much more detail. Filters provide the ability to drill down by college, department, classification, and more.
This first recent highlight I’d like to share is our Faculty Teaching Mentors program. The Faculty Teaching Mentors program is designed to strengthen teaching through collegial, faculty-to-faculty support. The program brings together experienced and highly regarded faculty—across disciplines—who volunteer to share their expertise and serve as a resource for their colleagues.
The program takes an on-demand, conversational approach. Faculty can easily schedule a one-on-one meeting—either in person or online—to talk through real teaching challenges or explore new ideas. Topics range from engaging students in large or online classes, to responding to accommodations, to incorporating active learning or improving assessment strategies.
The goal is simple: create a trusted space where faculty can learn from one another, exchange practical strategies, and continuously improve their teaching. In doing so, the program not only supports individual faculty, but also helps build a stronger, more connected teaching community at NIU—ultimately enhancing the learning experience for our students.
You are welcome to reach out to a Faculty Teaching Mentor anytime and please also remind your colleagues of the amazing support and expertise that our Faculty Teaching Mentors have ready to share.
Our Teaching Effectiveness Institute continues to be a cornerstone of how we support faculty development at NIU. This spring’s institute, “Teaching Beyond Perfection,” brought over 40 faculty together to reframe teaching not as a pursuit of perfection, but as an ongoing process of growth, reflection, and learning from real classroom challenges.
Through an engaging keynote and highly interactive sessions, participants explored how normalizing teaching setbacks can actually strengthen our practice, build resilience, and foster more inclusive and effective learning environments.
A special highlight of the institute was the leadership of our Faculty Teaching Mentors, who facilitated breakout discussions grounded in real experience—helping colleagues move from reflection to practical, evidence-based strategies they can apply in their own classrooms.
I want to extend a sincere thank you to our Faculty Teaching Mentors for their leadership and contributions. Their willingness to share openly, guide conversations, and support their peers is what makes this institute—and our broader teaching community—so impactful.
My second recent highlight is our Open Classroom Weeks. Our Open Classroom Weeks initiative is one of the simplest—and most powerful—ways we foster shared learning around teaching at NIU. It gives faculty the opportunity to step into a colleague’s classroom—not as an evaluator, but as a learner—to observe real teaching in action across disciplines.
Participants see firsthand how colleagues design activities, engage students, and structure learning experiences, often sparking ideas they can immediately adapt in their own courses. Just as importantly, it builds connections across departments and helps us develop a shared understanding of what effective teaching looks like at NIU.
I want to extend a sincere thank you to the faculty who opened their classrooms this year. That level of openness and generosity—inviting colleagues into your teaching space—is what makes this program possible and so impactful.
And for those of you here today, I encourage you to consider participating in a future Open Classroom Weeks—whether by observing a colleague or by opening your own classroom. It’s a low-stakes, high-impact way to learn from one another and continue strengthening our teaching community together.
The third recent highlight is our Online Learning Tool Review. We have three major Blackboard-integrated tools up for renewal this summer. This created an important opportunity to step back and take a more intentional, evidence-based look at our learning technology ecosystem. Rather than simply renewing tools by default, our goal was to ensure that what we’re investing in truly aligns with faculty teaching needs, supports accessibility, and reflects responsible, sustainable use of institutional resources.
To do this, we conducted a comprehensive review. We analyzed three years of actual usage data to understand not just how often these tools were used, but how they were being used compared to their intended purpose. We paired that with faculty survey feedback and qualitative insights to better understand experiences on the ground.
We also examined each tool through the lens of cost, accessibility, privacy, and the availability of alternative solutions—particularly where existing Blackboard or institutionally supported tools might already meet those same needs.
Together, this gave us a much clearer, data-informed foundation for making thoughtful decisions moving forward.
We’ve made the full Online Learning Tool Review report available on the CITL website, where faculty and leaders can explore the findings in more detail, including tool-specific summaries and faculty survey results. This report brings together everything we’ve learned from usage data, faculty feedback, and our broader evaluation of each tool’s role in teaching and learning at NIU.
The review focuses on three Blackboard-integrated tools, each with a distinct intended purpose. Respondus is primarily used to support assessment integrity and secure online testing environments. VoiceThread is designed for multimedia discussion and presentation—allowing students to engage with content through audio, video, and text-based interaction. And Yellowdig is intended to foster community-based discussion and ongoing student engagement through a more social, networked approach.
What this report does is make those intended uses transparent alongside how the tools are actually being used across courses at NIU—giving us a clear, shared foundation for thoughtful decisions moving forward.
Based on this comprehensive review, we developed a set of recommendations that balance instructional value, faculty needs, and responsible use of institutional resources—and I want to note that these recommendations have been shared with and endorsed by the faculty Innovative Teaching and Learning Advisory Committee.
| Tool | Recommendation | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Respondus | Renew centrally | High use; integrity; compliance |
| VoiceThread | Discontinue | Declining use; redundant |
| Yellowdig | Limited / local | Steady use in select programs but costly to license for all |
For Respondus, the recommendation is to continue central funding. It remains widely used, plays a critical role in supporting academic integrity, and helps meet compliance expectations for secure online assessment.
For VoiceThread, the recommendation is to discontinue central licensing. Usage has declined, and in many cases, its core functionality can be effectively replicated with tools already available within Blackboard or through other institutionally supported platforms.
And for Yellowdig, the recommendation is a more targeted approach—moving away from a full institutional license and instead exploring limited or local use in programs where it demonstrably supports community-building and engagement, while recognizing that it is costly to sustain at scale.
Together, these recommendations allow us to focus our investments where they have the greatest impact while still supporting innovation where it’s most meaningful.
As part of this process, we engaged directly with our vendors—sharing our approach, our data, and our preliminary findings. Even in cases where the outcomes may not align with vendor interests, we felt it was important to be transparent and collaborative throughout.
What’s notable is the response we received. As reflected in this quote from VoiceThread, the process itself was recognized as thoughtful, inclusive, and grounded in real rigor—bringing together multi-year usage data, faculty input, and a clear, transparent review structure.
Thank you for sharing all of that and being so transparent about the process. I've seen many similar reviews of tools being used by an institution and the process CITL has run is one of the most thoughtful, inclusive, and transparent technology evaluations I've seen anywhere. The combination of multi-year usage analysis, faculty surveys with published results, and a clear public timeline reflects real rigor. Unfortunately these kinds of reviews are usually done poorly so even though we don't love the outcome, at least so far, I did want to congratulate you and your team on the actual work.”
I share this not just as positive feedback, but as validation that the approach we’ve taken reflects best practice in evaluating instructional technologies. It reinforces that our decisions are not only data-informed, but also fair, transparent, and centered on what best supports teaching and learning at NIU.
We received similar feedback from Yellowdig, who also expressed appreciation for the transparency and care taken throughout this process.
“I really appreciate the transparency and the time you took to walk us through your decision-making process.”
Even when difficult decisions are being considered, maintaining open communication with our partners matters. It reflects our commitment to fairness, clarity, and professionalism in how we evaluate tools that impact teaching and learning.
Taken together, this feedback reinforces that our approach is not only data-informed, but also respectful and transparent—ensuring that all stakeholders, including our vendors, understand how and why these decisions are being made.
Moving forward, our focus is on ensuring a thoughtful and supported transition.
First, we are continuing conversations with vendors to explore reduced licensing options for FY27. This allows us to better align costs with actual usage, while also providing time and flexibility for faculty who are currently using these tools.
Second, we are developing clear transition plans—particularly for VoiceThread and Yellowdig—to help faculty understand what changes are coming and what alternatives are available.
And most importantly, we will be communicating timelines proactively and providing hands-on support to faculty throughout this process. Our goal is to make this as smooth and low-disruption as possible, while ensuring that faculty have access to effective, sustainable tools that support their teaching.
Now looking ahead, here are 3 upcoming highlights we wanted to share today.
As we think about how best to support teaching at NIU, we’re launching a couple of important efforts to gather updated faculty feedback.
First, we’ll be conducting a campuswide survey of faculty. The last time we did a comprehensive survey focused on teaching with technology support was in Fall 2020, so this is an important opportunity to reassess current needs. The survey will focus on CITL services, classroom technology and learning spaces, and also AI support and resources—areas where we know things have evolved significantly in recent years.
I also want to briefly highlight a second, more targeted effort connected to an NSF S-STEM grant focused on undergraduate STEM education. In mid-April, faculty teaching upper-level STEM courses will receive a short, anonymous survey about their instructional practices. This is designed to give us a snapshot of what teaching looks like in these courses today and to help inform upcoming professional development.
As an added benefit, faculty who complete that survey will be eligible for paid professional development opportunities beginning this summer through CITL.
So if you’re in a STEM field, we’d greatly appreciate your help in sharing this with colleagues and encouraging participation—and more broadly, we look forward to using this feedback to better align our supports with your needs.
I also want to highlight an upcoming opportunity focused on accessibility in teaching—the Accessibility Institute taking place May 12 through 14.
We’ve intentionally scheduled this institute in May—after commencement and once grades are posted—but while faculty are still on contract and, we hope, more available to participate.
This is designed as a series of practical, hands-on workshops spread across three days, with flexibility built in. Faculty can pick and choose the sessions that are most relevant to them—there’s no expectation to attend all three days—and we’re offering a mix of both online and in-person sessions to make participation as accessible as possible.
The sessions will cover a range of high-impact topics, including Universal Design for Learning, creating an accessible syllabus, using Blackboard Ally, improving accessibility in common tools like Word, PowerPoint, and PDFs, as well as video captioning and more.
In addition, each day will include opportunities to meet one-on-one with an Accessibility Ambassador to work through a specific accessibility challenge in your own course.
Overall, the goal is to provide practical strategies and individualized support to help faculty make their courses more accessible and inclusive for all students.
My third and final highlight is the announcement of Summer AI Curricular Innovation Grants. The Provost’s Office is making a strategic investment this summer in faculty, focused on high-impact course redesign involving AI.
These grants are designed to support faculty in thoughtfully integrating AI into their courses—helping students develop the skills they’ll need while also enhancing teaching and learning in meaningful ways.
We’re especially prioritizing high-enrollment undergraduate courses, along with General Education and other required courses, where this work can have the greatest reach and impact on our students.
You can find additional details and the application. I encourage you—or your colleagues—to take a look and consider applying.
This is an exciting opportunity to experiment, innovate, and contribute to NIU’s leadership in AI-enabled education.
Faculty selected for these grants receive a comprehensive support package designed to make this work both feasible and impactful.
This includes $5,000 in summer pay to support the course redesign work—shared if multiple faculty are collaborating on the same course. Participants will also receive a one-year Microsoft 365 Copilot premium license to explore AI tools directly within their teaching and workflow.
In addition, there is up to $250 available for instructional materials or tools that support the redesign effort.
And importantly, faculty won’t be doing this work alone—CITL staff will provide consultation and support throughout the process to help translate ideas into effective, student-centered course design.
Together, this package is meant to provide both the resources and the partnership needed to support meaningful, high-quality course innovation
Ultimately, this initiative is about more than individual course redesign—it’s about the outcomes we’re aiming to achieve for our students and our institution.
We’re working to build students’ AI literacy and critical thinking skills so they can use these tools thoughtfully and responsibly. At the same time, we want to connect that learning to career-relevant applications, helping students understand how AI is being used in their fields.
For faculty, this creates space to experiment with innovative teaching approaches that enhance engagement and learning. And importantly, we’re looking to develop scalable models—approaches that can be shared and adapted across disciplines to extend impact beyond a single course.
Finally, we’re committed to gathering evidence of impact on student learning, so we can better understand what’s working and continue to refine and expand these efforts over time.
Thank you for your time and for the important work you do every day to support student learning at NIU.
Everything we’ve shared today reflects a collective effort—faculty, staff, and partners across the institution—working together to strengthen teaching, thoughtfully integrate new technologies, and support our students’ success.
If you have questions about any of these initiatives or would like to get involved, please don’t hesitate to reach out. We’d be glad to continue the conversation and connect you with resources or opportunities that align with your interests.
Thank you again, and we’re happy to answer any questions.